1. Elections and Campaigns

2. Campaigns: Then and Now
Parties are less important
Media, polling, and money are more important
People are hired to perform campaign tasks
Media consultants
Direct mail firms
Polling firms
Political technology firms

3. Campaigns: Then and Now
Today’s candidates spend the most on media
2004: presidential and congressional candidates spent a combined $1.2 billion on media
Plurality of political ads were designed to appeal to voters’ fears (impending war, losing a job, etc.)

4. Federal Campaign Spending: Where the Money Goes
Election Cycle Spending

5. Introduction to Presidential and Congressional Campaigns
Two phases: getting nominated and getting elected
Getting nominated
Getting a name on the ballot
An individual effort (versus organizational effort in Europe)
Parties play a minor role (compared with Europe)
Parties used to play a major role

6. Major differences Presidential races are more competitive.
House races have lately been one-sided for Democrats.
Presidential winner rarely gets more than 55 percent of vote
Most House incumbents are reelected (more than 90 percent)
Fewer people vote in congressional elections
Unless election coincides with presidential election
Gives greater importance to partisan voters (party regulars)
Congressional incumbents can service their constituents.
Can take credit for governmental grants, programs, and so forth
President can't: power is not local
Congressional candidates can duck responsibility.
"I didn't do it; the people in Washington did!"
President is stuck with blame
But local candidates can suffer when their leader's economic policies fail
Benefit of presidential coattails has declined
Congressional elections have become largely independent
Reduces meaning (and importance) of party

7. Running for president Getting mentioned Setting aside time to run
Using reporters, trips, speeches, and name recognition
Sponsoring legislation, governing large state
Setting aside time to run
Reagan: six years
May have to resign from office first
Money
Individuals can give $1,000, political action committees (PACs) $5,000
Candidates must raise $5,000 in twenty states to qualify for matching grants to pay for primary
Organization
Need a large (paid) staff
Need volunteers
Need advisers on issues: position papers
Strategy and themes
Incumbent versus challenger: defend or attack?
Setting the tone (positive or negative)
Developing a theme: trust, confidence, and so on
Judging the timing
Choosing a target voter: who's the audience?

8. Getting elected to Congress
Malapportionment and gerrymandering.
Establishing the size of the House

9. Getting elected to Congress
Winning the primary
Ballot procedures
Developing a personal following for the "party's" nomination
Incumbent advantage
Sophomore surge
Using the perquisites (perqs) of office
Campaigning for / against Congress
Impact of the way we elect individuals to Congress
Legislators closely tied to local concerns
Weak party leadership

10. Differences between primary and general campaigns
What works in a general election may not work in a primary
Different voters, workers, and media attention
Must mobilize activists with money and motivation to win nomination
Must play to the politics of activists
Iowa caucuses
Held in February of general election year
Candidates must do well
Winners tend to be "ideologically correct"
Most liberal Democrat, most conservative Republican
The caucus system: "musical chairs and fraternity pledge week"
The balancing act
Being conservative (or liberal) enough to get nominated
Move to center to get elected
True nationwide in states where activists are more polarized than average voter
The "clothespin vote": neither candidate is appealing
Even primary voters can be more extreme ideologically than the average voter Example: McGovern in 1972

11. Two kinds of campaign issues
Position issues
Valence issues

12. Television, debates, and direct mail
Paid advertising (spots)
Has little (or a very subtle) effect on outcome: spots tend to cancel each other out
Most voters rely on many sources of information.
News broadcasts (visuals)
Cost little
May have greater credibility with voters
Rely on having TV camera crew around
May be less informative than spots
Debates
Usually an advantage only to the challenger
Reagan in 1980: reassured voters
Primary debates: the "dating game" in 1988
Risk of slips of the tongue on visuals and debates
Ford and Poland, Carter and lust, Reagan and trees
Forces candidates to rely on stock speeches
Sell yourself, not your ideas
Free television time to major presidential candidates in 1996
The computer
Makes direct mail campaigns possible
Allows candidates to address specific voters
Creates importance of mailing lists
The gap between running a campaign and running the government
Party leaders had to worry about reelection
Today's political consultants don't

13. Money How important is it?
"Money is the mother's milk of politics."
Presidential candidates spent $286 million in 1992; up from $177 million in 1988
Are candidates being "sold" like soap? Answer is not so obvious

14. The sources of campaign money
Presidential primaries: part private, part public money
Federal matching funds
Only match small donors: less than $250; $5,000 in twenty states
Gives incentive to raise money from small donors
Government also gives lump-sum grants to parties to cover conventions
Presidential general elections: all public money

15. Congressional elections: all private money
From individuals, PACs, and parties
Most from individual small donors ($100 to $200 a person)
$1,000 maximum for individual donors
Benefit performances by rock stars, etc.
$5,000 limit from PACs
But most PACs give only a few hundred dollars
Tremendous PAC advantage to incumbents: backing the winner
Challengers have to pay their own way; only one-sixth from PACs

16. Campaign finance rules
Watergate
Dubious and illegal money raising schemes
Democrats and Republicans benefited from unenforceable laws.
Nixon's resignation and a new campaign finance law
Reform law
Set limit on individual donations ($1,000 per election)
Reaffirmed ban on corporate and union donations, but allowed them to raise money through PACs
Set limit on PAC donations ($5,000 per election to individuals, $15,000 per year to a party)
Federal tax money made available for primaries and general election campaigns.
Impact of the law
Increase in money spent on elections
Increase in PAC spending
Additional problems: independent expenditures and soft money
Campaign finance reform
Reforms can have unintended consequences
Bipartisan Campaign Finance Reform Act of 2002
Ban on soft money
Increase on individual contributions (to $2,000 per candidate per election)
Restrictions on independent expenditures

17. Money and winning
During peacetime, presidential elections usually decided by three things:
Political party affiliation
State of the economy
Character of candidates
Money makes a difference in congressional races
Challenger must spend to gain recognition
Jacobson: big-spending challengers do better
Big-spending incumbents also do better
Party, incumbency, and issues also have a role
Advantages of incumbency
Easier to raise money
Can provide services for constituency
Can use franked mailings
Can get free publicity through legislation and such

18. What decides elections?
Party identification, but why don't Democrats always win?
Democrats less wedded to their party
GOP does better among independents
Republicans have higher turnout

19. What decides elections?
Issues, especially the economy
V. O. Key: most voters who switch parties do so in their own interests
They know which issues affect them personally
They care strongly about emotional issues (abortion, etc.)
Prospective voting
Know the issues and vote for the best candidate
Most common among activists and special interest groups
Few voters use prospective voting because it requires information.
Retrospective voting
Judge the incumbent's performance and vote accordingly
Have things gotten better or worse, especially economically?
Examples: presidential campaigns of 1980, 1984, 1988, and 1992
Usually helps incumbent unless economy has gotten worse
Most elections decided by retrospective votes
Midterm election: voters turn against president's party

20. What decides elections?
The campaign
Campaigns do make a difference
Reawaken voters' partisan loyalties
Let voters see how candidates handle pressure
Let voters judge candidates' characters
Campaigns tend to emphasize themes over details
True throughout American history
What has changed is the importance of primary elections and tone of campaigns
Theme campaigns give more influence to single-issue groups

21. What decides elections?
Finding a winning coalition
Ways of looking at various groups
How loyal, or percentage voting for party
How important, or number voting for party
Democratic coalition
Blacks most loyal
Jews slipping somewhat
Hispanics somewhat mixed
Catholics, southerners, unionists departing the coalition lately
Republican coalition
Party of business and professional people
Very loyal, defecting only in 1964
Usually wins vote of poor because of retired, elderly voters
Contribution to Democratic coalition
Blacks loyal but small proportion

22. The Effect of Elections on Policy
Political scientists are interested broad trends in wining and losing
Cynics: public policy remains more or less the same no matter which official or party is in office
Comparison: Great Britain, with parliamentary system and strong parties, often sees marked changes, as in 1945
Reply: evidence indicates that many American elections do make great differences in policy
Why, then, the perception that elections do not matter? Because change alternates with consolidation; most elections are only retrospective judgments